Ever heard Adventists complain that 1
Peter 4:17 does not speak of a Judgment that will start at the House of God as
the Investigative Judgment that will be prior to the Executive Judgment or
Hell-event?

Well, this chapter will make those
people think twice. And it is not just Adventists that think in this direction.
It was the common way to interpret Zechariah 5 as a case of God’s judgment, and
secondly, as cleaning the remnant from the impure in the remnant and to remove
them. A cleansing of the sanctuary as some Victorian scholars suggested.

Two scholars cannot be off the table
for this chapter. They are Friedrich Delitzsch and August Köhler.
Not because they are always right but because they are always helpful for
Adventists living in the wake of the start of the Advent Awakening and thinking
also in the same lines at times. Yet they still fall short of the reality.

Umbreit and Rabbi Kimchi saw that the
size of the roll and the size of the Temple Holies are the same so the Judgment
goes out from the throne of God in the Temple (Köhler 1860: 164). Köhler wanted
to see it as the size of the curse or evil actions of the sinners to such an
extent that it is the same size as the holies of the Temple. Other scholars thought
that it is just a complaint by the Lord against all unsanctified places so that
explains the sanctuary size of the roll, but Köhler was not convinced by this.
Köhler said that the fact that it is not the size of the Most Holy, or the
outer court, indicates that the visible and public sins of the people is the
issue here.

Neumann indicated that the Holy is the
place where the blessings for [spiritual] Israel is pronounced (Köhler 1860:
164). Thus, concluded Neumann, this roll is the size of the evil of those who
did not want to join the blessings of spiritual Israel. Neumann may be on
something here.

It is true that Hengstenberg declared
that the roll is not a symbol of the Temple or the Holies. Köhler said that
this judgment is against all sins, not just public sins. Secret sins and public
sins are involved.

The curse written on this roll is
against the “whole earth” kol ha-arezt (so Hoffmann and Neumann) and not only
against the whole land [of Israel] (so Köhler, Delitzsch, Hengstenberg, Hitzig,
Umbreit, Ewald and Baumgarten).

Thieves and cursing people will be
removed. This is the cleansing of the sanctuary or the Holies from the thieves
and cursing people. The word for “cleansing” or “becoming clean” is niqqa (see
Isaiah 3:26). Adventists know very well about the cleansing of the sanctuary
since they know the time when this would happen: After 2300 years, then the
sanctuary would be cleansed or justified.

Köhler said that if His people or
people of the world did not take advantage of the cleansing and expiation of
sins that were offered in the Holies, then they have to be exposed to the
executive judgment of rejection symbolized by the roll (Köhler 1860: 166).

On one side of the roll are the curses
against the thieves and on the other side the curses against those who curse in
the name of the Lord. They will be removed from the earth.

It is the sins of the hand and the
mouth that are involved here (so Ewald). However, most commentators think it
refers to sins of both the tables of the Law of God. Theft is on one side and
cursing on the other side of the two tables of the Law.

How this judgment, this investigative
judgment is to take place in biblical terms is when the thrones are set up
before the Almighty in the time of the Most Holy according to Daniel 8:14 when
the Son of Man (Christ) will appear before the Father in the Most Holy phase of
the Day of Atonement event function.

This flying roll with their sins,
utilized during the holies part of the sanctuary in antitypical heavenly
sanctuary investigative judgment since 1844, was brought forth by the Lord “I
have brought it forth, says the Lord of Hosts…” verse 4. What is brought forth?
The deeds of the thief of the second table of the Law of God mentioned first
and the deeds of the one who is swearing in His name second from the first
table of the Law of God. Investigative Judgment takes place in relation to the
Law of God. We are judged by our works of faith or no faith. We are saved by
our faith. Thus, the Adventist systematic professor, Edward Heppenstall in his
book, Christ our High Priest.

The endresult of these found unworthy
of the price Christ paid for us will be that disaster will strike their homes
(verse 4 last part).

The angel then left Zechariah and came
back again to him (verse 5). Rabbi Redak in the Middle Ages said: “After the
angel showed the prophet the vision of the flying scroll, he vanished from the
prophet’s sight. Then he reappeared, spoke to the prophet and showed him the
vision of the ephah”.

He then saw an ephah going forth
(verses 5-6). “And He said, this is the eyes upon the whole earth”. For
Delitzsch and Köhler is it just the land of Israel (Delitzsch 1884: 280 “is
just the land of Canaan”) but for Adventists it may mean the whole earth as
also Hoffmann and Neumann argued in the Victorian period.

Delitzsch translated the that the
ephah “is going out”.

The Trinity is God viewing everything
and nothing is hidden from their eyes. Judgment is thus fair and just. It is
penetratingly.

An ephah was a measure container in a
market. It could hold 5-7 gallons. The SDA Bible Commentary cited in 1963 by A.
V. Wallenkampf on Zechariah in the Sabbath School Quarterly suggested 5 gallons
but the 1944 Sabbath School Quarterly by A. Chase on the prophets suggested 7.

Whereas I suggested that it is the eye
of the Lord looking penetratingly at the works of the Law of the saints [1
Peter 4:17 saying ‘judgment must start first at the house of God’] in the
Investigative Judgment since 1844, Rabbi Rashi of the 12th century
CE suggested that it refers to the eyes of the wicked that were over the entire
land to rob and oppress.

Delitzsch made a point that the “eyes”
should not be translated such but rather with the semantics of “shape” or
“appearance”. The ephah had the shape. Said Delitzsch: “The ephah (bushel) is
the shape, i.e. represents the figure displayed by the sinners in all the land,
after the roll of the curse has gone forth over the land, i.e. it shows into
what condition they have come through that anathema (Kliefoth)”.

When the lead lid of the ephah was
lifted, inside was sitting a woman but she is interpreted as “wickedness”.
Delitzsch says that the sinners, the brokers of the law of God, first table and
second table are viewed as one personality, an evil woman in the ephah (verse
7). Delitzsch said that the woman did not come into the ephah for the first
time. She was already there when the lid was raised (Delitzsch 1884: 284).

In 2 Chronicles 24:7 the name of
wickedness or mirsha`ath that is given to this woman in the ephah of Zechariah
was given to Jezebel. In the time of the first Elijah, the name of wickedness
was given to Jezebel and in the time of the third Elijah after 1844, the name
of the sinners from the “house of God”, the wayward remnant, will be also the
same “wickedness”.

Sitting in the midst of the ephah
(verse 7) it seems that she stood up because the Lord “cast her into the midst
of the ephah” (verse 8). Wickedness of the wayward remnant during the
Investigative Judgment is placed where it belongs, in the penetrating
visibility of the Lord.

Now the lead lid or cover is thrown at
the woman where it ended up in the mouth, not of the woman but of the ephah
container (so Köhler 1860: 175 and Delitzsch implied the same). The ephah, an
instrument for measuring became a jail. Belshashar was weighed and found too
light. He was measured as well that last night in 539 BCE when Gobryas entered
the palace and Daniel exited.

In verse 9 Zechariah lifted up his
eyes again and saw another image. It could be other detail in the same vision
so that the flying roll, the woman in the ephah and this one in verse 9 are all
connected (so Delitzsch).

Two flying woman, with wings similar
to that of a stork came and lifted up the ephah between heaven and earth (verse
9). Zechariah wanted to know where they are going? (verse 10).

The answer was that they would take it
to the land of Shinar [a name for Babylon] to prepare it [root kwn] and they
shall place it there on its base [root kwn]. What Satan did through the Little Horn
activities in Daniel 8:10-12 is to disturb the base or niche [kwn] of God. In
the prophets that [kwn] would be restored in the eschaton.

Babylon is the word that means gate of
the gods and every empire in history had a “Babylon” so that this name is almost
symbolic. Babylon was built in ancient times in the land of Shinar. Delitzsch
did not like the concept though. He felt that Shinar is “not the earth as the
sum of all lands” (Delitzsch 1884: 280).

"The women denote the instruments
or powers employed by God to carry away the sinners out of His congregation,
without any special allusion to this or the other historical nation"
(Delitzsch 1884: 284).

To interpret what is in the text thus
far, is that when the time of the End comes, with speed and with swiftness, two
females (good or bad or mixed) will be instruments to help carry the bad woman,
symbolizing the lawbreakers, the first table and the second table, the Catholic
Church maybe to set itself up on a foundation [kwn] as anti-foundation against
the niche [kwn] of God sanctuary. This will happen near the end of the
Investigative Judgment when the flying roll would have listed all the sinners
“in the house of God” (1 Peter 4:17) in fullness so that the measures of the
roll is equal to that of the holies, where saints are supposed to obtain grace
from Christ our Righteousness as substitute on our behalf.

Ellen White said in Faith and Works
page 30 “So great is the deceptive power of Satan that many have been led to
regard the atonement of Christ as of no real value”. “The doctrine which
teaches freedom, through grace, to break the law is a fatal delusion. Every
transgressor of God’s law is a sinner, and none can be sanctified while living
in known sin”.

Dear God

Open our eyes, that we may see, thy
loving grace so dear and free. We pray in Jesus Name. Amen.